By certifying Trump's election win, Kamala Harris makes Jan. 6 routine again
CBC
For two centuries, the certification of U.S. presidential election results was little more than a ceremonial rubber stamp by Congress.
News outlets all but ignored the day of the official electoral college count, a routine procedural step on the way to the new president's inauguration.
It's hard to imagine that the vast majority of Americans gave the event more than a moment's thought before Jan. 6, 2021, when rioters — egged on by Donald Trump and his relentless, baseless claims that the election had been stolen — rampaged through the Capitol to try to stop the count.
The U.S. may never again have the luxury of being so blasé about Jan. 6.
And yet on Monday, vice-president Kamala Harris presided calmly over the ceremony to certify the victory of Trump, her Republican rival in the 2024 election. Harris announced Trump's 312 electoral college votes to her own 226, to the applause of Congress.
Exactly four years ago, vice-president Mike Pence had to be rushed off the Senate floor to safety, after conceding that his boss, Trump, had lost that election, while a mob outside the Capitol chanted "Hang Mike Pence!"
The contrast between the two days couldn't be any more stark.
"I welcome the return of order and civility to these historic proceedings," Pence said Monday on X.
In a video message released Monday morning, Harris described her role in the certification as a "sacred obligation" to ensure the peaceful transfer of power.
"As we have seen, our democracy can be fragile," she said. "And it is up to each of us to stand up for our most cherished principles."
Four years after the riot that threatened to alter the results of a free and fair election, it's far from clear how Americans will perceive the events of Jan. 6, 2021, as Trump takes office again and time passes.
President Joe Biden is urging people in the U.S. not to pretend that what happened that day didn't happen.
"An unrelenting effort has been underway to rewrite — even erase — the history of that day," Biden said in an opinion piece published in the Washington Post.
"We cannot allow the truth to be lost," he added.
